


Not by Example

by Pan (Lucky_Cassandra)



Category: Linked Universe - Fandom
Genre: birthday fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-14
Updated: 2020-12-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:28:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28074717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lucky_Cassandra/pseuds/Pan
Summary: Twilight had done many dangerous and reckless things on his journey, but he believed he had learned the difference between a necessary risk and a stupid stunt. He liked to think that this was why the rest of the group thought of him as level-headed and cautious.(A 5+1, of sorts.)
Comments: 21
Kudos: 187





	Not by Example

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Okami_no_fude](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Okami_no_fude/gifts).



> Happy Birthday my lovely.
> 
> This little thing has been thought up, planned and written word per word only for you. 
> 
> I have been sitting on the completed thing for nearly 10 days, and you know how hard that can get, but it had to be today.
> 
> I gratefully acknowledge pulveremcomedesligulas and ShadowMyst, who helped me come up with the scenarios and get the tone right for some of them.
> 
> I hope you have an awesome day!

There were times when Twilight found he was grateful that most of them didn’t share much about their adventures, because that meant he didn’t have to share much, either. All the Links had faced the dark, the evil, the dangerous, the downright _terrifying_ , and had walked away with a victory under their belt, in the end, but also some level of trauma. The Ordonian knew that he was no exception. He joked about his broken heart (true as that was) so he could better cover up the secret of the Hero’s Shade he carried, but there were also things he didn’t want to share of an entirely different nature. 

Of course they had all needed to be reckless at times, do crazy stuff, as was clearly shown by how ready they all were to come up with harebrained plans which had a ridiculous potential to backfire, but surprisingly, during this adventure with eight other versions of himself, Twilight had found himself perceived by the rest of the group as the level-headed one. The Links seemed to rely on him to keep others from overstepping from brave into pointlessly reckless. And, well, he couldn’t exactly tell Wild to stop setting trees on fire, Wind to stop jumping off cliffs for fun, Legend to be careful when using so many magic artifacts at once or Sky to stop trying to befriend every feathered being he saw when he had done worse, could he? 

Of course this begged the question of what some of the others were still keeping quiet, by design or simply by not finding them interesting enough to tell. As far as Time came, the mischievous, _impish_ smile he tried to hide sometimes made Twilight entirely believe the former. With Wild, _definitely_ (and terrifyingly) the latter.

So he tried to keep some of his stories to himself, he really did, but there were times when something slipped anyway, or when one of his own past experiences came in handy to the whole group. However, no one had called him out yet, so he hoped to keep it that way.

***

The Great Hylia Bridge in Wild’s Hyrule was incredibly similar to how the bridge had looked during the Twilight Invasion. Of course, in his era, the bridge had been repaired after Ganondorf had been defeated, but that didn’t change the intense sense of deja-vu Twilight had when crossing it. If anything, it made the memories stronger, taking him back to the times he had come here as a wolf, a familiar weight on his back. The bridge really did look a lot like it had then, the main difference being that the thick, tall walls flanking the bridge, broken only by the occasional window, were gone now, replaced with low parapets. The Ordonian liked it better this way. The walls were high enough to keep the people crossing the bridge safe, but low enough to leave the beautiful view of the lake open.

And, if he was being honest with himself, making it a hell of a lot easier to jump off the bridge if need arose, for example if it happened to be on fire. Completely hypothetically.

“I can’t believe how huge this thing is. Impressive and really gorgeous,” Hyrule said, eyes wide as he took in the stone work. 

“Look at how high up we are, the water down there looks so far away…” Wind breathed, awe in his voice, as he leaned over the parapet to look at the glittering lake below.

Wild smiled, nodding. "A very good place for stretching our legs. Well, Sailor, how about a dive?” There was a dangerous twinkle in the Champion’s eyes, but for once Twilight was not remotely worried.

The Veteran nearly growled. "Are you crazy? I know you like to pull stupid stunts, but what the hell? You’ll break every bone in your body."

The Ordonian spoke before he had time to think, too caught up in his memories. "Leave them, there's actually water in the lake now. They won’t get hurt.”

He realized his mistake a beat too late, and turned to find Wind, Wild and Legend all staring intently at him, lips parted and eyebrows raised in surprise. 

“What do you mean there’s actually water in the lake now?”

 _Damn._

***

Warriors' Hyrule was exhausting. Even though whatever interdimensional war had been fought there was over, the space-time rifts mended, there were still monsters of all kinds around here. Moblins, assorted boblins, lizalfos, stalfos, and so on. To make it worse, they had been spending the better part of the day searching for the way up _a huge cliff,_ of all things, because rumor had it an old ruined castle at the top of the mountain had been turned into a massive monster camp. The whole region was suffering monster attacks left and right, villages had been ransacked and burned, people had gone missing, and the Links hadn’t needed to be asked twice to look into it.

The beast they were facing at the moment, however, looked oddly familiar to Twilight. He had never fought a monster precisely like this, but there was something to its large, powerful wings that reminded the Ordonian of something.

“That’s an arealfos,” yelled the captain over the din of the fighting. “Use your hookshots to drag him to the ground, or there’s no way you’ll beat it!”

Ah. That did spark a few memories. The deja-vu Twilight was experiencing got stronger when the Link to his right spoke in an oddly awed voice.

"That thing is as big as a Loftwing. Too bad we can't exactly use it to get to the top of that cliff," Sky said.

The Ordonian was forcefully reminded of being swept up by a large flying shadow beast and being carried halfway through Hyrule. Unpleasant as it had been, he couldn't deny it had been extremely effective, and very, very useful. He studied the long talons of the monster as it flew above them. 

"Yeah, those talons would hurt, they seem very sharp and long," he mused. "If we wanted that thing to carry us, we would need to find a way not to get killed before we even took off. And then we would have to find a way to _steer_ it, against its will, and that…" he trailed off when he felt the Skyloftian's baffled eyes trained on him.

"What?" Sky asked. "First of all, I would _ride it_ , how would you even think of letting him actually _grasp you_ and carry you away? Secondly, I wasn't seriously considering using _a monster_ as a ride!"

Twilight felt a heavy hand slap his shoulder, followed by Time's amused voice. "I don't think we are quite that desperate yet, Pup."

 _Desperate?_ Huh. Well maybe he had been.

***

“Well, that was surprisingly effective,” Hyrule whistled. 

“You don’t say,” Four grumbled, sword in hand, as he ran forward. “I have to admit, though, when the explosives didn’t work, I thought nothing short of powerful magic would have managed to get rid of that barricade. I wouldn’t have believed for an instant a boar could simply barge through.”

Twilight said nothing, busy as he was with trying to control the rampaging boar. Having herded goats back home for years, as well as all the experience riding bulbos he got during his quest, had come in handy for once. He grasped the boar’s tusks and reached forward, putting an arm in front of the animal’s eyes and holding fast, making shushing noises to help the animal calm down. When it didn’t work, he jumped off and manhandled the boar until it was facing the forest, then released it and jumped back. Predictably, the animal ran straight forward and made a beeline for the freedom of the forest. The Ordonian stood panting for a second, before drawing his sword and joining his friends in fighting the lizalfos which had been hiding behind the barricade he had just blasted through.

It was only a handful of monsters, luckily, so the fight was fast and relatively easy. Twilight knew the other Links' curiosity would be piqued when he decided to mount a boar to break through the barricade, but he had hoped they would forget his stunt in the heat of battle. To his dismay, it appeared they hadn't. 

“Now, I know you told us again and again how you handled large animals back home, Farmer, but hearing it and seeing it are two very different things,” the Captain said, a touch of admiration in his voice, once they had set up camp for the night. “Also, I honestly didn’t think you would actually _ride_ the goats.”

“That was really cool,” interjected Wind. “Do you guys ride the goats often, in Ordon?”

Twilight's hand found the back of his neck before he could stop it. He needed to find a diplomatic response to talk his way out of this.

"Well, when you have seen how tough the fencing has to be to keep in an angry goat, you can't really help getting ideas…" he began, sheepishly. 

"But _riding_ an angry goat?" the Sailor pressed again.

"Yeah, well, that…"

"I can't believe you give me grief over riding _bears_ ," Wild grumbled under his breath.

Well, _damn._

***

Even the biting cold did nothing to dampen the raw and powerful _beauty_ of the Hebra mountains. The blindingly white snow glittered like a million gemstones in the sun under a blazing bright blue sky. The sharp rocks which surfaced here and there were in varying shades of gray, and translucent ice structures reflected the sunlight, completing the breathtaking picture. 

Twilight pulled his wolf pelt closer to stave off the cold wind. They were looking for shelter, after having been dumped on these mountains by another blasted portal, as the temperatures would drop further as soon as the sun went down. Luckily, most of them had at least some way to protect themselves from the cold, and Wild’s seemingly bottomless supply of potions and extra clothing had the rest of them covered.

“I think I know where we are, now,” Wild called cheerily. “At the bottom of this slope, down in the small valley just around that crest, we should find a safehouse we can spend the night in.” He moved towards the steep slope below them. “I have a way to get down fast to check that everything is fine, and I’ll have a fire going before you get there! When you get to the bottom of this slope, look right, you’ll see a huge flagpole. Head in that direction. See you soon!”

With that, he pulled the slightly bent shield he was carrying off his back and, after a short running start, jumped on his shield and slid away with blinding speed. Very soon, he was only a speck at the bottom of the slope.

"Ooh, that looks fun," Hyrule breathed as Wind nodded fervently.

“Don’t even think about it,” Legend snapped. 

Time, Warriors and Twilight chuckled.

“Speaking of, ranch hand,” the Captain began, “you normally try to dissuade the Wild one from doing crazy dangerous stuff, he jumped on his beaten up shield and slid down the mountain and you didn't even bat an eyelid."

Twilight blinked as he turned to look at Warriors, working to keep his face neutral. He hadn’t even registered that this would be seen as weird or dangerous, because he had done exactly the same thing, but on an even frailer frozen leaf and on behest of a _yeti._ The Cub was at least using a proper shield which was _designed_ to have some resistance, and had first tried it following the suggestion of another Hylian, someone he could at least reasonably trust not to be actively trying to get him killed... 

“And he _jumped over a pile of rocks,”_ Warriors continued. “How is that not triggering that mother henning thing you do, rancher? It’s almost enough to give _me_ anxiety.”

Twilight frowned. Maybe his perception of how dangerous this was _had_ been skewed, but he had had to jump over ravines and chasms, so a few rocks hadn't really seemed like a big deal. 

It seemed he would have to reassess a couple of his life choices.

***

" _Goddesses,_ Wild, could you watch where you swing that torch?" Twilight snapped. 

He hadn't meant to sound so harsh. He really hadn't, but something in the way the dried grass just _lit up_ around them as the Cub waved his torch, coupled with the knowledge of Four's and Legend's bags of explosives stored a little ways away behind them back at camp had his skin crawling. 

The Champion looked at him, an eyebrow raised and a small smirk on his face. "I was just clearing some space for us, I don't have a sword to cut it with.." his look quickly morphed into concern. "Are you ok? You look pale."

The Ordonian _hated_ when this particular memory intruded. He was glad it didn't often. The burn scars on his back, now fully healed and usually entirely forgotten, started pulling and itching. He was really glad no one had asked about them yet.

One of the stupidest things he'd ever done. 

It was relatively early in his adventure, he and Midna had not been friends yet, not by a long shot. She kept bossing him around, telling him all day how inept he was at everything. He had been hunting down a stupid shadow insect, and that _thing_ had decided to hide in an old shack. A shack full of explosives. Midna kept pressing him, hurrying him, shouting at him, _insulting_ him. And to draw the insect out, he had picked up _a torch_. Inside _a wooden shack_. Full to the brim of _explosives._ Plastered with signs that said _not to do that._

The whole thing had gone up in flames so quickly he hadn't even seen the fire spread. He had turned to find a wall of fire, tongues of flame licking hungrily at the boxes of explosives, and heard Midna's voice telling him she was getting out of there, that he was on his own.

Nothing could ever really compare to that moment of _terror_ , coupled with the feeling of just how badly he had _messed up_ , the knowledge of his own mistake, his own _stupidity_ being to blame for the mess he was in.

He had learned many things that day. Caution. Patience. Not to take anything for granted, not even Midna's goading and her reluctant company. Thinking ahead to possible consequences of his actions. And just how painful third degree burns were. He had learned that there was a line between taking a risk and doing something stupid, and he had never really overstepped that line again.

So when he told one of his friends to be careful when playing with fire, he _meant it_ with all his heart. Taking gambles when the stakes were high, sure. Pulling a risky move in battle, of course, sometimes it was unavoidable, and there was always the chance that a plan backfired, sometimes literally. But he wished he could make them _see_ just where that line was.

He hoped the only way to see it wasn't after you had stepped past it already.

***

Twilight could only stare in shock and alarm as the narrow stone bridge Hyrule had just crossed collapsed, rocks and debris disappearing in the dark, bottomless chasm below.

“Hyrule!” Legend yelled. “Step back, the ledge behind you!”

The traveller complied, pressing himself against the cliff wall as the narrow shelf he was on kept crumbling. The treasure chest he had been trying to reach began sliding as a whole section of the floor tilted dangerously, and joined the rocks tumbling into the abyss.

“How are we going to get him out of there?” Wind nearly whined. “There is nothing a hookshot will latch on to, and that ledge will not last long!”

“It’s too far to jump, even using magic or an item.”

“A sailcloth won’t help, we are on the same level.”

The Ordonian looked around a bit frantically, searching for an idea. He looked up, and the glittering, low roof of the cave they were in gave him an idea.

“Cub,” he said, voice urgent. “What is the range on that magnetic rune thing on your slate? Can it reach the ledge Hyrule is on?”

Wild turned to look at him, eyes wide. “Yes, I’m sure it could, but it’s too strong, I’ll just rip anything he is holding away from him.”

“Not something he will be holding. Can you keep something metal anchored to the roof of this cave?” Twilight answered, hastily going through his bag.

“Yes, but…” the Champion trailed off when he saw the Ordonian pull a pair of heavy-looking metal boots from his pouch.

“You want me to use magnesis to anchor those to the roof of the cave _while you are wearing them?_ ” Wild asked, his voice incredulous. “I can’t anchor one boot at a time, and even if I could I can’t switch boot while you are up there, you’d fall.”

“Don’t worry about that, I’ll manage. Just keep me up there,” Twilight said, voice grim.

“Twi, you’ll be flipped upside down, also when I activate the rune it will be as if you were free falling towards the ceiling!”

“Wouldn't’ be the first time,” he grumbled. “I’m ready. Hurry, we don’t have much time. When I get close to Hyrule, I will move down the wall to reach him. Keep me against it.”

The Cub nodded, looking pale. “I’m ready. Three, two, one!”

Twilight felt a tug on his boots, and then the familiar feeling of falling upwards. He landed on the roof of the cave with a resounding crack, but the roof, the boots and the magnesis rune all seemed to hold. Using all his strength, he began slowly making his way to the other side of the chasm. He had done this enough times to know just how slow the whole procedure was, but the rocks that kept falling from the crumbling ledge and vanishing into the darkness below gave him an unprecedented sense of urgency.

After a couple of long minutes, he managed to make his way down the wall and grasped the Traveller's hand. Luckily, Hyrule was light, agile and pretty strong himself, and managed to climb somehow on the Ordonian's back, leaving him free to concentrate on getting them to safer ground. Even with the added weight, the magnesis rune held strong, and after a few more tense minutes of resounding booms in the cavernous space, the two Links collapsed in a heap back on the stone floor.

"That," Hyrule said, out of breath, "was the weirdest thing I've ever seen or done, and let me tell you, I've _seen_ weird."

"Goddesses, Twilight, the way you moved… you've obviously done this before, haven't you?" Sky asked.

"What are those boots even _for_? Were they designed for this?" Legend interjected.

The Ordonian wiped sweat off his forehead with the sleeve of his tunic. He was too tired to bother trying to worm his way out of this one, the cat was out of the bag, anyway.

"Actually, they were originally designed to wrestle Gorons," he panted.

The Captain gasped. "To do _what?_ "

"But I didn't only use them for that or to walk on ceilings. I also used them to sink to the bottom of lakes."

"You _WHAT?_ "

Time laughed long and hard. "Pup, I'm not sure we should have the Champion be your protegè, after this."

"Are you kidding?" Wild protested. "I want to _learn his ways. Where can I get a pair of those?_ "

"Actually, Twi," Wind said in a teasing tone, "now we know that when you tell us not to do something stupid, you know what you're talking about because you've _done it already._ "

The sound of their laughter echoed on the stone walls around them.

Well, _Damn._


End file.
